Influence
by Light1
Summary: Mortal women may be physically weaker but their strength lies in different places as Alucard must learn.


**Influence**

Disclaimer: Castlevania belongs to konami not me. I am making £0.00 out of this fic, it is written purely because I have a burning need to create. Although I would like to own Alucard . . . then he'd be mine.

Rating: PG-13

Part: one of one

Setting: Post SOTN

Authoress note: Maria contemplates her influence over Adrian.

**Influence**

Time changes everything. It was strange to think that even though she had changed over the years, he had changed more than she had. It was strange for one so seemingly changeless to have become something so different to the man she knew all those years ago. Than man lifting her now was most defiantly not the same man whom she had met in the castle. She could remember that meeting clearly despite the years that had passed. He had been covered in blood, dirt and other things she was trying not to think about. But more significantly he had been embarrassed. After the events in the castle he had been so dead set on his path, but she had managed to persuade him otherwise. She had convinced him that his chosen course was perhaps not the wisest and that martyrdom did not suit him. It had taken some doing but he had relented and he had gone with her. Even in those early days she was a catalyst for change in him. He had been so self conscious when he had first agreed to come and 'visit' her. She had heard of what happened to him and to his mother. Living through something like that was an unthinkable horror, so she was not surprised by his trepidation. Had she been in the same position she would not have had his courage to come with her.

Time had taught her that he was not afraid. But rather that he was worried of making other people afraid. Not for the reaction it could prompt in them which could be deadly, but simply because he didn't want to upset people. He had flinched every time he had done something that wasn't considered perfectly mortal. Every time he had broken something that a human would not have been able to and every time he had lifted something to heavy for a human to even move he had hidden himself away for days on end. He would only ever speak in monosyllables as if trying to fade into the background. He had been embarrassed not just by his nature but by his own ease with his nature. He was almost comfortable with the fact he could pull a tree from the earth as if it were a weed. He was uncomfortable with the fact that he was so comfortable with this. But to see him now, no one could think him embarrassed. The trees were moving past in a blur as he ran. She was wrapped in one of his cloaks. It was one of the ones Richter had given him and was warm and thick. The wind whipped past her, burning her face with cold. Adrian was unaffected and was contentedly bounding across the landscape faster than any creature she could name. Occasionally he would leap and they would fly across the ground, and hop over lakes like they were puddles.

Something had happened over the years, she wasn't entirely sure what but something had happened between them and he had begun to relax. Perhaps it was her effort to drill into him that she knew what he was and was perfectly happy with him. Perhaps it was the fact that she didn't flinch when she touched him, maybe it was when she offered him her wrist to feed him when he fell ill. She wasn't sure but something had happened and he had begun to stop hiding away when he did something 'strange'. This was not the first time he had taken her for one of these runs. They had become more common the more relaxed he became. He had wanted to show her views from the mountains, places no human had made it alive. He had wanted to show her the great lakes and the deep caves. She had helped him to become himself. She had managed to talk him into mixing with mortals again. She had even tried to talk him into becoming a doctor. His ability to listen and smell the human body in ways that told him things that no human could know would save lives. Unfortunately her powers of persuasion lacked the strength to make him do this for strangers, although he did save Annette and Richter's youngest son this way.

Now she was old and he looked not a day older than the day she had met him. Yet still he had changed more than she had. He smiled at her and she smiled back, feeling the wrinkles around her mouth deepen. She had become self conscious of her wrinkles when they had first appeared but simply looking at the way he looked at her was enough to put her mind at ease. He watched her all the time and anyone could see the devotion in his expression.

"Are you cold?" he asked, she nodded and he slowed his pace a little. The wind became slightly more bearable.

"Are you going to tell me where we are going?" she asked, he smiled wider. Something he would never have done all those years ago, but it was something he did regularly now.

"No," he answered, his expression tried to be innocent. But his features resembled his father's just a little too much to ever look truly innocent. Although she would never tell him that. Fortunately their eyes were different. Adrian had his mothers eyes and that changed his face enough that she did not see his father when she looked at him. It was only when he pulled certain expressions that she could see the resemblance. Dracula had pulled the same 'I-am-totally-innocent-of-all-and-any-wrong-doing' expression when he had kidnapped Annette.

"You're mean to me," she sighed and snuggled further into his grip and wrapped the clock tighter around herself.

"Pure evil," he smiled again and leapt up into the air. They hurtled up and landed gently on one of the thicker branches of one of the trees, bare due to the winter months. He leapt again and took them further up the hillside they were climbing. She liked it when he would jump like that, it was almost like they were flying, the cloak he wore even looked like wings for a split second. She was very glad at times like this that he had chosen to relax enough around her to be himself. Oh yes she was very happy with her influence over him.

**End**


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